Fiction with bite

Book Reviews

Some people get offended when authors write book reviews, especially of books wherein they have stories. In a sense, it seems like cannibalism. Personally, I’d love to read other people’s opinions about this collection rather than deal with platitudes about how I should be acting. Take this with a grain of salt or trust it as the gospel, but this is the account of my five favorite stories from this collection, and mine was not one of them.

Truth be told, my deeper point of writing this review is to hopefully start discussions either here or on Goodreads, and maybe on Amazon.

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I enjoyed this twisted anthology. It is quite dark and diabolical. I expected 26 tales of cold-blooded murder and psychotic rampage, but didn’t expect to find the huge diversity of vision and the balanced array of talent. Reading the author profiles in the back pages revealed a host of experienced authors with several publications under their belts.

This book is so much more than just expertly written tales of murder. There are ‘braindead zombies’ and there are sex-crazed zombies. You’ll also find military robots and time machines, demon possessions and angry ghosts, wandering barbarians and panicked wizards, astral travelers, drug addicts, and you will even experience being poisoned once. Way out from left field come sentient centipedes, genetically-modified pigs, and natural disasters. AMOK!!—the name fits it all.

Picking five favorite stories out of this collection was insanely difficult. My favorites won’t be yours, so read this book and tell the world which ones you liked best—this collection is worth reading. Seriously, there are so many great stories in here. These were my five favorites.

I’ve made no attempts to hide my respect and appreciation for Timothy Baker’s written works. As luck would have it, I’ve been published in three anthologies with Timothy. (However, all three have recently gone out of print.) I’ve heard that we are again going to be printed together in an upcoming anthology named, That Hoodoo, Voodoo, That You Do.

Earlier this year, I’d read Timothy’s debut novel, Hungry Ghosts Path of the Dead. It was a fun read about what happened in Tibet on the same night as George Romano’s Night of the Living Dead is taking place in the mid-west U.S.

Gerald Forsythe dreads Halloween. As an old man confined to a wheelchair, he is dependent upon oxygen to help him breathe through bouts of emphysema. He watches the door, waiting, wondering where his nurse is. She was expected to come and switch out his medicines and ensure he will make it through the night. She is late as the clock rolls on; Halloween is coming.

Kelli is a substitute nurse. Gerald’s normal nurse couldn’t make it due to a sudden illness. Kelli, unlike Gerald, loves Halloween and doesn’t understand why the old coot can’t shake a leg and get in the spirit. Kelly opens the door and lets the Halloween spirit into Gerald’s house, as well as a horror from Gerald’s past. Now, they are trapped and need each other if they have any hope for survival.Continue reading →